This Timid Girl (Likes Very Much Your Hand)
by Bea Candy
Summary: Stacy blinked and thought she felt tears escaping, but thankfully or infuriatingly Candace didn't notice. (One-Sided Stacy/Candace)
1. Lips Are Dry

She was beautiful.

Not her dress, even though her dress was perfect. It was the way that the dress left her shoulders bare, the way that it complimented her figure, the way that it just showed off the most beautiful features that Stacy had always forced herself to ignore.

It was her eyes, those deep midnight eyes, wide and round and gorgeous, that she had only yesterday been able to avoid gazing into, but with that dress, with that jewelry putting everything out in the open and making her into an object of beauty, it was hard to see her otherwise, hard to push the dreams and fantasies out of her mind.

Stacy blinked and thought she felt tears escaping, but thankfully or infuriatingly Candace didn't notice.

"How do I look? Do you think Jeremy will like it?"

She tried to answer with her dry throat but found no voice. She coughed quietly and forced out, "Well, this is Jeremy we're talking about."

"Well, I know, but it has to be perfect! This is really important. Not school-dance or restaurant-night important, either."

"I-I know." Stacy cursed her inability to force the stutter out of her voice. She looked at the dress again and said, "It's a bit showy." It was a lie. She just didn't think she could force herself to survive through her wearing that dress, thatperfect dress.

"Yeah, I guess. I'm gonna put it to the side, though, it's probably my favorite so far."

Stacy nodded absentmindedly, looking at the ground.

 _She was sitting alone in her first grade class, looking at the ground. She was the new girl, after all, so it wasn't like she had expected to get a partner. She hadn't gotten partners back at her old school, either, so she didn't spend more than thirty seconds feeling sorry for herself. She looked at the blackboard for the steps before quickly recognizing them as the steps for making a paper crane. She smiled that at least the project was something easy and took the paper and folded it over itself._

 _Finished, she looked around to see the other kids struggling to even begin. She grinned and took another couple of papers to make a few more and quickly folded another._

 _"How did you do that?" she heard an incredulous voice behind her say. She turned around to see a girl with orange hair and wide blue eyes._

 _"It-" she forgot the word and paused, trying to remember, "it easy."_

 _"Yeah right! This paper is too thin. It keeps ripping!"_

 _She giggled into her hand before mulling over a sentence in her mind, making it and trying to put the words in the right order. "I…can show you…"_

 _With no further warning, the girl sat down next to her, leaning on her shoulder in order to look closely as she slowly folded the crane so that the girl could see._

 _"I'm Candace," the girl whispered almost like a secret as she watched her hands move with fascination._

 _"Stacy," she replied without looking up._

"Stacy?" startled out of her trance, Stacy looked up and blanched.

She'd thought the other dress was perfect.

"I really like this one! I think I'm gonna take it!"

She tried to force herself to find a contradiction but her mind went blank as Candace twirled around and she saw her back. Unable to think of anything else to say, she filled her voice with false cheer and said, "It's perfect."

Candace grinned and, for a moment, Stacy could force herself to forget why and enjoy her happiness.

"There's my beautiful bride!" came a voice behind her, and with the word all of Stacy's happiness rushed away.

"And there's my gentleman of a groom!" Candace said with excitement, turning to kiss him passionately.

"I love you so much," he said.

Stacy held her tongue.


	2. It's Best To Say Little

p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Breaking up with Coltrane had to be the best thing that had ever happened to Stacy./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Not that there was anything wrong with Coltrane, of course. He was nice enough, if a tad quiet. He never pushed her into things she didn't like, never tried to move too fast. In fact, even when he figured out her true motivation of a chance at double-dating with Jeremy and Candace and she confessed everything to him, he never hated her, barely even got angry, even went along with it for a little while until he decided it had gone too far./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"The breakup was mutual, and there were absolutely no hard feelings on either side. They resolved to stay good friends and agreed that this was for the best./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Of course, there was no way that Stacy would tell Candace that./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""Don't worry Stace, it'll be okay, I promise."/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She loved the feeling of Candace's hand on her back as she lay down on her bed crying crocodile tears over a fake love lost. The way it lingered over her hair and passed through it, the way it pressed the fabric of her shirt close to her back and almost came through the stitches of the fabric, sending shivers as their skin collided. She could almost imagine that the circumstances were different, that this was preceding a moment of bliss./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""I mean it, really, forget about Coltrane."/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Done and done,/span Stacy thought sarcastically, but she didn't let that seep into her face as she continued, continued to cry over who-knows-what-really and let her smile exist only in the deepest regions of her heart./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""Trust me, you're way out of his league."/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"With this, Stacy sensed a chance and looked up, her eyes red and hair disheveled as she weakly said, "Really?"/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""I mean it. You're beautiful, smart, nice, and an amazing friend."/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Each compliment was like a kiss to her addled mind because it gave the smallest piece of hope to her and she began to feel happy enough to be forced to smile, overwhelming her tears. Candace smiled in satisfaction and took her hand away, to which Stacy reacted with disappointment, disappointment that the moment had ended up so short./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""I have to go, now. But I'll be back in a little while, okay?"/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Her disappointment went away slightly and she wordlessly nodded./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""Don't worry, Stacy," she said from the door, "Any boy would be lucky to have you."/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She left./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Aaaaand, there it was again./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Any boy./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Stacy started to cry with that, real tears this time, even as she knew that no orange-haired angel would comfort her./p 


	3. Short Stacks Are Sitting High

She felt hollow.

She felt like everything inside of her had been smashed into dust. If someone cut her open, she felt like they would find no brain because her thoughts were numb, no lungs because her breaths were empty, no heart because her love was hopeless. She felt like her mouth had been cemented closed because it refused to open. She had nothing to verbalize that she wanted to make known and could not think of anything harmless to say so she stayed silent.

She knew that she would be able to get away with crying, she was actually supposed to cry so it would be okay, but she couldn't get herself to. There were no tears, no gasping sobs or mucus flowing from her nose or lumps in her throat.

"Dearly beloved. We are gathered here today…"

She tuned it out to focus on the couple. They directed small happy glances toward each other, beamed at the day and the event. Jeremy had a tuxedo with a perfect cut while Candace had a dress that suited her and her personality perfectly, too perfectly, if only she had made an excuse because this was a forced torture. If only she had been suddenly unable to come, if only Candace's gleeful urging was less toxically convincing, if only she had enough courage to run away from home and never return, never look back.

"I do," she heard Jeremy say and she fumed at how in love he was. It wasn't fair that he was so perfectly kind and his love was truly amazing, if only he had been some sort of villain wishing to use Candace, than he'd be an obstacle. But he was a dream and even though she couldn't be attracted to him, she could see his appeal and she hated it. She hated every ounce of his caring and respect and kindness and wanted more than life itself to pulverize it.

"I do," Candace said after they listened to the vows and it seemed grotesque that the voice was so confident, so mature. If only she was still that jealous and nervous girl with low self-esteem, positive that this was all a dream or a joke. If only Jeremy hadn't helped her learn to love herself and others, if only he was just some mean kid who let her hyperventilate every day.

"If anyone has any reason to object to this union, speak now or forever hold your peace."

This was the part in the movies where the admirer steps up and confesses and the bride runs off with them and leaves the groom staring. This was the part with the drama and growth and resolution because two soulmates always feel the same and true love is always requited and any outlying feelings are shallow and insignificant.

"I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride." The two needed no further urging to kiss each other passionately.

They sat together on the bed, small enough that they could both fit on it, giggling with a glee only found in seven-year-old girls who had stayed up past their bedtimes together.

 _"I can't believe that she wore that!"_

 _"Who does she think she is, the queen?"_

 _They started to snicker even more loudly and Stacy smiled that this was their time together, that she was a special person to Candace, her best friend, a title nothing would ever trump. She felt happy around Candace and knew that she was the only person who could make Candace laugh like that._

 _She was important._

She forever held her peace.


End file.
